[4]

[carnality.livejournal.com]

Basically, we've been allowing doubles of characters on a case by case basis. It's come to our attention how difficult and sensitive this can be, and it'd really help us know what you think.

Feel free to be completely honest but be tactful of it. Do not call people out, do not make examples of people who are not comfortable being made examples of and if you get into a discussion with someone, keep it civil or take it to IM. I will freeze threads if I see people are getting too personal or heated (and you can happily IM me and tell me I was wrong if I mistake your passion for anger, consent would be needed from both in the discussion.)

Basically, double characters, yay or nay? How do you feel about it? What are the pros and cons of it, in your mind? Should we allow instances of it, or should we just ban it all together? Should it not be so black and white?

There was some discussion on this post here about it earlier, if you'd like to expand on ideas or whatever you like.


We are not going to force anyone with doubles to drop their characters, this is in no way going to affect any of you so please don't feel the need to get defensive! We just want to know, for the future, what we should consider. ♥ thank you, in advance. :D

Comments

[untangles.livejournal.com]

I say 100% NO on doubles unless it is viably different canon. Like for example-various TMNT canons and Kingdom Hearts vs. Final Fantasy, or like FMA when the manga and anime have very different backstories and canon facts.

Allowing doubles at different points in timelines is just...Cloud in FFVII and Cloud in Advent Children is the same person, he has the same history, the same relationships, it's just different points in his life. It's the same canon and there is no reason to allow a FFVII Cloud, if we already have one that's post Advent Children or whatever.

Cloud is just an example, nothing on our Cloud.

[maraich]

Well, I've already expressed some thoughts earlier.

Personally, I think the first mun with the character should give consent. I mean, there are some cases that are totally AU that I don't think it'd be necessary (for example, in Patalliro Saiyuki it's a different universe, and Maraich isn't even named Maraich. He's a monk instead of an assassin, he even says killing is wrong... So I don't think in that case someone would need permission. Since I use orange-hair/blue eyed Maraich, they wouldn't even look exactly the same). Although I wouldn't expect the mods to know all the info offhand, especially not for every series, but they can ask if they need to.

On the other hand there are series that basically rehash the same story, and the characters are supposed to be basically the same. I'll just use another sample from my own series. I play manga!Maraich. He's basically the same as anime!Maraich, although they change a couple things. But in that case, it would be very close to the character I'm already playing, so I probably wouldn't want someone to app anime!Maraich (especially since I incorporate a couple things from the anime. Much like a lot of people do with their characters).
I think in that case it should probably be discussed with whoever had the character first.

And then there's the third scenario, like we discusses about Phoenix, which probably happens the least often. That's where it is the same character, but in a different part of the timeline that's far away from the timeline the original mun is playing from. I think consent would be important there, too, but the option should be open because sometimes it's almost like a different character.

Overall, I think it's important that: The characters be reasonably different. The person who had the character first is ok with it.
And, in the last case, it would also be important that there's a decent time lapse between character A and character A2. If it's something like 6 months... Well, it's completely likely that the first character would be on DDD for six months and get to that part of the timeline. With something like 5 years it's easier to make it that the timeline never overlaps like that without stretching it out so much.

[maraich]

Oh, yeah, and I think taking into account DDD can mess up canons is important, too.

For example? Maraich has Matthias.
Matthias doesn't exist in the manga (well, he sort of does, but he's kind of dead and he never had a name). So obviously anything I do in Patalliro-verse now has to take into account that Maraich has a son that he didn't originally have.
It creates it's own unique timeline that doesn't match up with the original timeline, thereby sort of making it an AU universe even though I took him from canon.

In other words, sometimes a character taken from canon becomes AU on DDD, and can never get back to the actual canon perfectly. Which makes it more plausible to treat it like a different universe instead of "this character is exactly the same person as this one from later".

For example, if DDD Phoenix got married to Maya and had three kids, he could never become Hobo Phoenix. Because Hobo Phoenix never married Maya and never had three kids. If that all makes sense?

[death-chopper.livejournal.com]

Personally, I think going case-by-case is the best bet. It's far too subjective an issue to do a full ban or full 'okay' on.

On one hand, I know some canons have a lot of overlap between the various incarnations (some of the animes and mangas, I've heard, though I don't know for sure), or, like, Buffy the TV show and Buffy the comics. Anyone trying to app Buffy from the comics to compliment a (hypothetical) pre-existing Buffy from the show would have a very hard time justifying that Buffy as a distinct character from the first.

On the other, take something like Transformers, which has been around for twenty years and had, like, a billion different canons in several different media. Yeah, there's a lot of overlap between, say, G1 and the Dreamwave or IDW comics, or between the Unicron Trilogy series, but you definitely can't say that 'Bee from G1, the movie, and Animated are anything remotely resembling the same character.

I think it's best left up to the discretion of the mods, on a case by case basis, and perhaps the players of other characters in the canon in question--running it by the muns already on the comm to see if they think there is enough difference.

[felldeedsawake.livejournal.com]

Case-by-case basis.

In some canons, doubles of characters have actually occurred - Ben Reilly, Spider-Man's clone, or the numerous episodes in which the Doctor has met his earlier incarnations - these doubles were concurrent with the character's timeline. They met each other canonically and were aware of each other's presence.

But take a case where someone's trying to play a character from a different timeline or series? Is it a spinoff, is it an earlier/later version? These can cause trouble. Like haruzac said, [X character] from earlier canon and [X character] from later canon are the same person. In that case I would say no, that's not OK. If [X character] had some kind of spinoff/AU and it's a different canon in its own right, that would probably be OK. If that makes any sense. That's my view.

[attorneyatlol]

This will probably end up reiterating what I said in that other post... XD;

I think it should be on a case-by-case basis. I don't see why doubles of characters that exist in separate universes should be a problem (example: Raphael from the TMNT movies, Raphael from the 80s toon, and Raphael from the 2003 toon--those are all very obviously not taking place in the same universe). I think what it comes down to is whether or not two muns can play what are essentially the same character, only in a different part of their life.

Since I'm most familiar with Phoenix Wright, I'm going to use that as an example again. I'm playing Phoenix at a point before the third game takes place, but plan to eventually take him through game three canon. The fourth game takes place seven years in the future. I'm still up in the air on whether or not I'm going to set him on that path, but even if I did and we miraculously got a full Apollo Justice cast, I would never be in the same time as them canon-wise.

Here's where my opinion gets messy... XD;;

I can see why it wouldn't be allowed and agree with it to an extent. No matter how different Phoenix is in Apollo Justice, he is still the same character and I will not argue that. At the same time, though, Phoenix is a very important character in the fourth game and it would seem odd not to have him there should someone want to play him. If someone did, I, as a Phoenix Wright mun, would have no problem with that. Other than Ema, he's the only character that carries over into that game, so it's not like there would be 2 of each Phoenix Wright character running around.

[aliceinouran.livejournal.com]

I agree that if the canons are completely different, then doubles should be allowed, but if the only difference is the position in the overall timeline, it shouldn't be allowed.

For things where one canon carries on into another series of that (like, where they're all ten years older and have completely different lives), I think that the mun who has the earlier character should be asked first about whether or not they plan to advance their character to the next stage. If not, then it should be alright.

[createdpower.livejournal.com]

Well, alrighty, here are my thoughts.

If it is only later or earlier in the timeline, then no go. If it's from an alternate universe, then yes! So, we couldn't have the Link who was in Majora's Mask and the Link from Ocarina of Time because Majora's Mask is a direct sequel, but we could have the Link from OoT and the Link from Twilight Princess because the games are unconnected.
(Did that make sense? It's kinda a tricky thing to say properly...)

Only downside here is that we could end up with like 50 versions of each of the X-Men, and other characters from hugely branched franchises like that. So maybe set a limit? No more than three or four of the same character, regardless of the number of canons.

If it's iffy, then talk it out with the player of the character who is already around.

[death-chopper.livejournal.com]

One thing to bear in mind with the issues of hugely branched branched franchises is that, honestly, how many different Wolverines or whoever are people going to want to play? While yes, there is potential for abuse of the system here, is it really going to happen in our specific game?

Not to say this isn't a valid issue, but I feel like specifically limiting multiples to certain number is sort of silly. If people want to play another copy of the same character and can prove sufficiently that he's different from the one(s) already in the game, I think s/he should be allowed, regardless of how many we have already.

[jagan-glare.livejournal.com]

Your Link spiel makes perfect sense, *thumbs up* and it makes me wonder if we'll ever have a cartoon!Link, because that would be hilariously epic, XD though it does make me ask the "what-if" question, as in "what if someone apped as Kid Link from OoT/MM and then another person wanted to pick up Adult Link from OoT?" Adult Link would have no memories of Majora's Mask events, since MM occurred AFTER Zelda sent Link back to their childhoods.

...my apologies if that's confusing at all, but it was something I thought of. ^^;

Also, I should've asked this in my Nabooru journal, *LOL*

[createdpower.livejournal.com]

TIME PARADOX! DDD:

Man, I have no idea! XD That's one for the mods and the player of the character, I guess!

[shunraiken.livejournal.com]

I'm going to second those who said that different canons should be allowed, but different versions of the same character from the same timeline shouldn't. There's just too much potential for things to get REALLY messy if you've got multiple versions of the same character from the same canon running around. For instance, if a Kharlan War-era Yuan were to join, he'd likely find out about Martel's death and Mithos going nuts and would probably want to do something about it... but if he did that would throw off the timeline for MY Yuan, who is being played according to canon events. Otherwise you'd have to say that the two of them were alternate universe versions of each other, which is just opening up another can of worms entirely.

[new-avatar.livejournal.com]

I'm on the same boat as everybody else: doubles only if they're from distinctly different canons/alternate universes (i.e. Kingdom Hearts vs Final Fantasy, etc). Definite no to doubles of characters who are simply from different points in the same timeline. (As much fun as it would be to see a Crisis Core Sephiroth pop in for the lulz...) Doubles occurring in canon are okay too. Muns of double characters will probably want to discuss any issues that might arise, though that'll be their responsibility.

So yeah. Another vote for AU/canon-occurring doubles.

[jackdante.livejournal.com]

I'm in agreement that there shouldn't be multiple versions of the same character from different timelines of the same canon - taking FFVII as an example again, if a Crisis Core Sephiroth did turn up, I'd be a little OMGWTFBBQ, this does not make sense. :| Not only would having multiples of that same character complicate things, I also think that having a character on DDD makes that character personal and important to the player, so I think it would impose on peoples' interpretations of a character if another one turned up. It would be stepping on roleplay toes.

I'm not averse to having multiple versions of a character from different versions of a canon - again, as stated here, TMNT characters, or Transformers, or FFVII/Kingdom Hearts.

I think taking things on a case-by-case basis would be best.

[timey_wimey]

I'm agreeing with the case-by-case basis here. But if they're, as has already been said, from different canons within the same franchise (eg different Transformers series, KH vs FF, etc.) I think there's no problems allowing them.

I'm not sure how I feel about doubles from different points in the same canon, but I'd probably say no. :/ That's what dressing rooms are for...

Basically, what a lot of other people have said, by the looks for things. XD

[gunner-top.livejournal.com]

2nd line- Kinda' hard to say no when we have both Ten and Nine with that isn't it?

[timey_wimey]

Ah, you see, with the different incarnations of the Doctor, it's a slightly different story. They're essentially different people in terms of personality and looks - the only thing that doesn't change is their memories. Even the Doctor's opinion about fruit or some other mundane thing changes when he regenerates. I understand where you're coming from, but the mechanics of Doctor Who canon mean that it isn't as much of a problem with Ten and Nine (and any other number Doc) as it would be for say, lawyer!Phoenix and Hobo!Phoenix, or Crisis Core!Sephiroth and FF7!Sephiroth.

[ghostofdejungle.livejournal.com]

I agree about the case by case, but no to double from different points in the timeline, that could REALLY get confusing.

As I just know all of DDD is tired of all the shellbacks running around. D= Lol

[later-days.livejournal.com]

Not as much as the ninjas.... >_>;;;;

[immelmanturn.livejournal.com]

Fuck that shit, everyone needs more ninjas.

[technobubblegum.livejournal.com]

I agree with what you're all saying: case-by-case basis, different points in time don't count as different canons. Player consent might be good. But you already knew that, Nor. XD

[late]

[tourmalinefey.livejournal.com]

I'd say it should all be case by case with consent from players. I think that part is important, because some muns will be fine with duplicates, and some won't. I...can see the logic behind not having timeline-duplicates, because we're not actually taking them OUT of canon on DDD like other games, but I think that it depends on the timeframe - and again, mun permission.

~Miri

[gunner-top.livejournal.com]

And this brings about my thoughts on Tales and other canons, where the continuity spreads over CENTURIES.
What if someone apped Symphonia Martel- via ressurection not different timeline like Kharlan war and shit, but we already have Phantasia Martel, who, though she has a similar personality, is not the person Martel specifically. And the thing about people coming from earlier times, though I am opposed to any things like that regularly- I can't see anyone doing that with ToS and ToP because they are set 4000 years apart and the only similar characters are the summons and Martel. So I don't think anyone will suddenly Fast Forward them in time, it's just too much time to cross canonly with the comm.
Same applies to X and Zero from the MMZ and MMX series, where it's been 100 years and their personalities are widely different- where X becomes beyond responsible and a kind guardian angel from the pacifist and wuss- and Zero turned into a quiet rock hard fighter from an arrogant jerk with skills that own. And it's hard to scew time like that over a few months or years, cause we know, though amusing the thought is, DDD is not gonna' last a century, or probably even more than a few more years, sadly.
I'd say no to doubles where the years between are only like 2 to 10 years.

*late to the party*

[sex4necklaces.livejournal.com]

I personally don't like the idea of duplicate characters as a general rule, because when there was a Kingdom Hearts Tifa it bothered me a considerable amount because they have the same personality and looks, merely alternated history.

But, then, there's the case of Edward Elric where his anime and manga versions are distinctly different in personality. It is a tough decision. But, I vote "no" for all is best.